Lava Alert!
by Elemental Fantasy 13
Summary: Alice is convinced to take the morning off, leaving house and son in the hands of her husband. After a few unusually quite hours, she goes to see what's become of them. One-shot. Slice-of-life style. USUK.


**...I needed some writing therapy and stumbled onto a cute little idea. This was the result. :P**

 **I've been dabbling in a few other pairings, but nothing's ready to be posted yet. USUK was my first love, and I find it's the easiest pairing for me to write, though lately I've noticed my plot bunnies are straying into domestic territory.**

 **Enjoy!**

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Alice leaned back, stretching her arms overhead until a few joints crackled pleasantly. She sighed, checking her mug before turning her attention back to the book in her lap. She hadn't believed Alfred when he'd sworn up and down she'd get a morning to herself, able to relax for a change. Honestly she couldn't remember the last time she'd gotten the chance to do so. Not since Peter was born, certainly. Still, Alfred was nothing if not stubborn. This particular Saturday was the first one he'd actually gotten her to hand over everything. It wasn't that she didn't trust him to keep an eye on Peter and do chores, it just went against the grain to give up the reins completely.

It was almost noon now. Alice had not only finished the book she'd been inching through for over a month, she'd finished a second one too. She'd sipped her way through two mugs of tea, a minor miracle considering she'd barely managed to gulp more than half a cupa in over a year. Not since Peter had decided he didn't like naps anymore. She'd gotten a peek at her husband and son when she'd gone down to the kitchen to make the second cup of tea. At the time, Peter had been contentedly bashing Lego Transformers through what appeared to be a gruesome battle, Alfred scratching his head as he stared at the chart taped above the washing machine. The one the detailed all the settings one would need for each load, something Alice had found necessary after he'd turned every single piece of white clothing the small family owned pale pink and purple. Not seeing anything to worry about, she'd made herself a fresh cup of Earl Gray and minced back upstairs, climbing into bed and returning to her reading.

It occurred to Alice now that this had been nearly two hours ago. She hadn't heard much noise downstairs since. Until about three years ago, this wouldn't have concerned her. In fact she would have reveled in the silence. That was before she'd had a child to keep an eye on. Before she knew just how dangerous silence could be. Peter was a very creative child, even if he was only three and a half years old. The last time she'd noticed this eerie silence, she'd walked into the living room to see an entire wall covered in marker doodles as far as the toddler could reach. Worse, he'd gotten bored with the markers, and moved on to making his own lunch. It had taken an hour to scrub an entire jar of peanut butter off him and two rounds through the wash to get it out of his clothes.

Knowing full well she wasn't the parent from whom Peter had inherited this ambitious creativity, Alice swung her legs over the side of the bed, heaving a weary sigh. Well, it was nice while it lasted. Now to check on the damage.

Grasping her mug in one hand, Alice went to slowly open the bedroom door, peeking out into the hall. No sign of man or child. She stuck her head out, looking around. Still nothing. Not a peep. Were they outside?

Alice wandered out of the bedroom, glancing into Peter's room as she padded towards the stairs. Not only was it undisturbed, Alfred had somehow managed to get the boy to tidy up. It was something even she could only manage with several hours of nagging that often ending in threats to throw away anything still on the floor when she next checked the room.

A little impressed, but no less worried, Alice descended the stairs. She found the kitchen had been mopped when she deposited her mug in the sink, which had been cleared of dirty dishes. Okay, so she was more than a little impressed. Normally it took so much effort just to get Alfred to toss dirty clothes the extra six inches so they'd land in the hamper rather than next to it. Alice often forgot just how capable he was if he wanted to be, though for whatever reason this was on the long list of things Alfred only had two modes for: all or nothing. He walked or he ran. He did nothing but lay about or he went and did a day's worth of chores in a matter of hours.

Alice moved on to the living room next, and while she did find the two, she wasn't any less worried.

"Just what do you think you're doing?" she demanded incredulously.

"Get off the carpet!"

"Off, off, mum!"

"What are you talking about? What's going on here?"

The living room, while it had been vacuumed and dusted, had also been altered into a war zone of sorts. Peter's entire supply of army men and Lego's had been brought out, scattering the room strategically. It took a moment, but Alice decided they seemed to be massing an attack aimed at the loveseat, which Peter and Alfred were perched on. Her husband stood, barefoot and wearing only camo boxers, was standing with one foot on each cushion, his cheeks marked with black lines, Peter sitting on his shoulders. The boy had similar marks on his face, his toy soldier helmet on his head, Nerf gun in hand. His shirt had also disappeared, leaving him in his favorite pair of Autobot swim trunks. Alfred had a Nerf gun in each hand, and both were firing foam darts at the amassed army.

"Get off the floor, Ally! You're gonna die!"

Alice sighed. Well, at least this one would be easy to clean up. "How am I going to die, exactly?"

"The floor's lava! You come in here any farther and you'll burn up," he warned, taking out the Lego Megatron.

"Oh, really? They why are they safe?" she asked, pointing at the mini-army being mowed down by suction cup-tipped ammunition.

"They're lava-walkers," Peter warned, tongue sticking out of his mouth as he continued to miss just about everything he aimed at. Alfred never seemed to miss, which must have been making up for it.

"There's one more of these things behind Mt. Rocker," Alfred pointed out, grinning. "Attack them from behind, they'll never see it coming."

Alice looked. Sure enough, the last of Peter's Nerf firearm collection lay behind the rocking chair. She picked up the toy, turning to regard the two, starting to cross the living room. "You really expect me to join you? This is ludicrous-

"You're on the lava!"

"She's not dying!" yelped Peter, eyes widening.

"She's one of them, fire!"

Alice opened her mouth to protest, only to take a dart to the chin. She ducked as another clipped her shoulder, dropping behind the rocking chair. They wanted a fight? Fine. She was the only girl amongst four older brothers. If she was going to be dragged into this, the least she could do was make sure they regretted it.

Going down on her belly, Alice locked and loaded the plastic weapon, smirking as darts sailed over her head. They were wasting ammunition.

"Hold your fire," Alfred protested, apparently having the same thought.

As soon as the darts stopped flying, Alice poked head and gun around the chair, plugged off a shot, and ducked back again. Alfred yelped. She smirked. A direct hit.

She was locking and loading again when a choked noise reached her ears. Curious, she peeked out in time to see Alfred sway, eyes wide. Poor Peter had a panicked look on his face.

"Dad?"

"I'm hit."

Alice wasn't quite sure how he managed it, but Alfred was able to get Peter off his shoulders and onto the loveseat before dramatically stumbling from the cushions onto the coffee table, hand clasped over what she assumed to be the 'wound' in his chest. With one last strangled choke, he collapsed onto the couch, eyes closed, Nerf gun tumbling from his hand.

It took Peter a minute, but he scrambled from the loveseat to the table, firing wildly at his mother's hiding place. "Avenge, avenge!" he shrieked.

Biting back a giggle, Alice poked her head around the rocking chair, sending a few well placed shots back amid the wild fire her son was plugging off. They were so miss-aimed she even got to stick around to see if her artillery landed. It was worth risking her own fake death to see the result.

Alice might be a half decent shot, but she hadn't expected to land a dart smack in the middle of Peter's forehead. The look on his face was priceless as he slowly fell on his backside, Nerf gun clattering loudly on the wooden coffee table. Alice couldn't help it, a giggle escaped her lips. It was followed by another, before she gave in to outright laughter.

Alfred sat up. "What?"

Alice rolled onto her side, hand pressed over her mouth in a fruitless effort to smother the laughs. Curious, Alfred propped himself up on one elbow and peered around at Peter's face. A wide grin split his face as he cracked up. It took a minute, but the stunned look gradually melted off the tyke's face as both his parents disintegrated into laughter. He soon joined them, giggling helplessly until he rolled off the coffee table, which just made them laugh all the harder.

"His face!" Alfred crowed, trying to get up. His laughter was cut off abruptly in a yelp as he managed to step on a few of the scattered army men, flailing as he stumbled and fell to the floor. Muffled gibberish reached Alice's ears as he narrowly missed hitting Peter on his way down, only to land on even more of the painful toys.

She had been slowing down, trying to get up herself, but Alfred's barely contained swearing as he more or less face-planted on Lego's and felled army men sent her over the edge. She collapsed into helpless giggles all over again, wheezing for air. Seeing his father's blunder set Peter back into another fit of cackling.

"Oh, so that's funny, huh?"

Peter tried to scramble away, but Alfred grabbed him by the waist, hauling him back into his lap. Peter shrieked as the man set about tickling him with no mercy, thrashing uselessly. Alice managed to get to her hands and knees, crawling over to them, making a path through scattered toys as she went. It was slow going, but she soon had herself seated across from Alfred. Rather than help the flailing and bucking Peter, she joined the attack, wiggling her fingers up and down his sides. Peter wailed, face red as he laughed helplessly. He couldn't even speak by the time his parents had mercy on him, withdrawing their attack.

As she caught her breath, Alice glanced around the battleground. "You do realize you'll be cleaning this up, yeah?"

Alfred made a face. "Come on Ally, we were having fun."

"I didn't say we weren't."

Peter, assured he wouldn't be tickled half to death again, sat up in Alfred's lap. "I'm hungry."

Ruffling his hair, Alfred sighed. "And you say _I_ have a short attention span."

"Go get dressed," she ordered, shooing them both. "I'll make something."

In what might otherwise have been a humorous moment, Alfred and Peter exchanged a look.

"Uh, I can make something," Alfred offered, cracking an uneasy smile. "It's no biggie."

Alice huffed. "I can make sandwiches, Alfred."

He looked back down at Peter. "Can she?"

"Sometimes. She put spicy red on last time

"You put Tabasco on sandwiches?" he asked, not sounding overly surprised.

Alice huffed. "I'm getting better. You might have noticed I haven't burned the house down."

"Yet," he mumbled. Louder, he asked, "When was the last time you tried making cereal?"

"Monday. Mum wouldn't let me call firemen," pouted Peter.

"There was no reason to!" she protested.

It was part of the phenomena that was Alice in the kitchen. Prior to marrying Alfred, she'd mostly lived off frozen dinners and takeout. The most fascinating of her failures was that, for reasons thus far unknown, half the time she made cereal it would spontaneously burst into flames. She had gotten marginally better after Peter had started eating things besides baby food out of necessity, but not without a lot of effort. Still, whenever Alfred was home Peter quickly forgot about this and insisted his father do the cooking, even if it was making a PB&J.

"Alright, buddy, go get dressed. We can clean up after lunch."

"Why can't I eat like this?" Peter protested.

"Because your mom said so, and I'm not making you lunch until you do."

"You need to change too," she reminded him.

"I don't wanna," the tyke protested between them.

Alfred considered this. "I'll get dressed after you do."

Peter still didn't seem inclined to budge. Alice was about to order him upstairs in a more stern fashion, but before she could Alfred leaned over, planting a kiss firmly on her mouth. There was about half a second for her to register this before Peter was blurting "Gross!" and making a dash for the stairs.

Alfred grinned, but didn't break the kiss. Alice chuckled, bracing a hand on his shoulder as she returned it. She had to admit, this was a much more effective, not to mention more enjoyable, method of getting Peter to do as he was told.

He ran a hand through her hair, pulling away a little. "What do you think about making another one?"

Alice blinked. "Not _now_ , you know he'll be back in thirty seconds-

"Not now, later," he corrected, pressing a kiss to her jaw. "Give me the rest of the day and I'll have him so worn out we'll have to carry him to bed."

Alice arched her eyebrows, a little distracted as he started trailing kisses down her neck. "Since when are you so gung-ho about it?" Yes the idea had been to have more than one, but it hadn't been discussed much recently.

"We're not getting any younger," he pointed out, moving back up to peck her lips. "Yeah the first six months or so suck, but they'll just get harder the more we put it off. Besides, I think he's old enough to handle being a big brother."

"It's worth discussing," she relented, "but _later_." There was a rumble of feet making a dash back towards the stairs.

Alfred grinned, but as he started to kiss her in a manner that was most definitely _not_ a peck, Peter came running back into the living room.

"I'm dressed! Lunch now, you promised," he urged, grabbing Alfred's arm and pulling.

Alice giggled as he grimaced, clearly disappointed. "What, I thought you wanted more?"

"Like you said, discussing. Alright, alright, I'm coming. I need to get dressed too, remember? Go find something you want, I'll make it in a minute."

Chuckling softly, Alice got to her feet, shaking out her nightgown. She decided she could stand to get dressed herself, maybe give her hair a brushing. Mmm, so he'd decided it was time to have more? Alice had to admit she agreed the timing would be good. Originally they _had_ planned on trying again sooner, but then Peter was their first, and he was a handful. It was difficult to think of adding another when it felt like she could barely handle what she already had.

Alice had grown up with four older brothers, and she had made it very clear from the beginning that five was too many. Alfred had just had the one brother. They'd agreed two or three was a good number, but after some debate the number had remained flexible. Alice would have liked to have a set number in mind, but then Alfred had made the valid argument that they both had multiples in the family. Two of Alice's brothers were twins, Alfred's brother had been born exactly ten minutes after him. Research indicated that there _was_ a genetic predisposition, though Alice dearly hoped it didn't happen. She had finally gotten the hang of wrangling the two children she already had, she couldn't imagine how she'd manage two more of them.

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